Tag disabilities

A new policy being implemented by the New York State Department of Health (DOH) could end up neutering the Consumer Directed Personal Assistance (CDPA) program – and New York lawmakers are begging them to reconsider.

Assemblymember Richard Gottfried (D-Chelsea, Midtown) and State Senator Gustavo Rivera (D- Kingsbridge Heights) have written a letter to the DOH to try and dissuade them from making the change.

The Assembly Health Committee wrapped up 2017 with 34 bills signed into law and 19 vetoed, including four which were vetoed with specific agreement for further administrative actions. Some bills were signed or vetoed based on agreements to enact changes in 2018. (A governor often raises concerns and wants changes in a bill after it has been passed by the Legislature. This usually happens after the Legislature has adjourned for the year. It is not widely known to the public, but in New York it is common for a governor to insist that the leaders of the Legislature agree to changes in a bill as a condition of the governor signing it. If the legislative leaders and the bill’s sponsors agree, the governor then signs the bill and the Legislature enacts the changes early in the following year.)

The Assembly Health Committee also held public hearings including:

Home care workforce adequacy.

Adult home oversight and funding.

Health care services in state prisons and local jails.

Nursing home quality of care and enforcement.

Water quality budget implementation.

Immigrant access to healthcare.

Below are summaries of bills acted on by the Governor as well as the public hearings.

Contact: For Immediate Release

Mischa Sogut September 18, 2017

On Tuesday, September 19, the Assembly Committees on Health, Aging, and Social Services will hold a public hearing in New York City on safety and quality of adult homes (“adult care facilities”) A second will be held in Syracuse on September 28 at 11 AM at the John J. Hughes State Office Building.

Adult homes house both aging individuals and those with complex medical or mental health needs, providing supportive services for independent living. They offer services less medical than nursing homes or enhanced assisted living, but more so than senior living. Adult homes are funded largely by Medicaid and the New York State Supplement Program (SSP), which provides financial support to the aged and disabled. Advocates are concerned that the current SSP rate is too low, shortchanging facilities and affecting quality of care.

The hearing will examine the availability and quality of adult home services, including the impact of increased funding for such programs. Witnesses are expected to include adult home residents, advocates, and operators.

What:

NYS Assembly public hearing on adult homes

Who:

-NYS Assembly Committees on Health, Aging, and Social Services
-Adult home residents
-Resident advocates including self-advocates
-Adult home operators

On Wednesday, February 22, the Assembly Committees on Health, Aging, Labor, and Task Force on People with Disabilities will hold a public hearing in New York City on the crisis of New York’s inadequate home care workforce.

Home care allows individuals to receive health care and personal services to live at home instead of in a nursing home or other facility. There is a growing shortage of home care services for the elderly, people with disabilities, and people who are chronically ill. Advocates note that there is a shortage of home care workers that is causing waitlists for these services across the state at a time when demand is increasing. Inadequate Medicaid funding for home care may be a significant obstacle to hiring and keeping people in the home care workforce.

The hearing will focus on obstacles to recruiting, employing, and retaining a sufficient workforce. Witnesses are expected to include patient advocacy groups and self-advocates, home care and disability service providers, and home care workers and organized labor groups.

ALBANY – For the first time in its history, the Brain Injury Association of New York rallied at the State Capitol.

The gathering on Wednesday was a final push to convince lawmakers about the need to fund the specialized treatment this group argues, is so vital to their independence and recovery.

The fact that Laura Casellini is here to celebrate her 24th birthday is a milestone that wasn’t assured.

Five years ago the car she was riding in was slammed into by a drunk driver.

Still recovering from a traumatic brain injury, the East Greenbush woman credits the intensive and coordinated services she receives for her recovery.

“I have had a very good recovery,” she noted.

When asked if it would have been as good without the care, she replied, “It would not have been as good. I would have been stuck in a nursing home.”

In New York, services for brain injury patients like Casellini are provided through special waivers. It’s a system of payment and care the governor’s office wants to do away with, transitioning this population to managed care.

“140,000 New Yorkers and of them, 3,000 of them are on traumatic brain injury, TBI waiver,” explained Eileen Reardon, the executive director of the Brain Injury Association of New York State.

Fear about losing services and careful coordination of those services brought the Brain Injury Association of New York State, BIANYS, to the state Capitol for its first ever “Advocacy Day.”

They want to be sure their voices are heard in advance of the April 1 deadline for the state Health Department to release its transition plan.

They’re counting on support from leaders in the state Senate and Assembly.

“However the program is structured, whether it stays outside managed care or moves into it, that the unique, important elements of the TBI waiver are guaranteed in law and protected against tampering,” noted Democratic Assem. Richard Gottfried the Health Committee Chair.

Money to continue the services has been recommended by both the Assembly and Senate Health Committees.

However, anything can happen between now and when the governor presents his budget.

It’s still to be seen what the transition plan looks like when it’s released April 1.

The group of about a 1,000 people with developmental disabilities, their caregivers and family members gathered Friday outside the state office building in Hauppauge, holding placards that read “Fully Fund the $15” and chanting “Please be fair to direct care.”

A little more than two weeks earlier something similar took place at the Yes We Can Community Center in Westbury when Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo took the lectern and told the roaring crowd of about 500 mostly union workers that “this is about fundamental fairness.”

Thousands of developmentally disabled men and women in the Southern Tier live in the ranch-style homes that Brown’s organization operates or rely on the community services it provides. They count on the staff at the Franziska Racker Centers to help them live full lives, whether that means driving them to museums or helping them learn to buy groceries.

But the Racker Centers’ vacancy rate had nearly doubled over the course of a year to 17 percent. Job candidates would schedule interviews but wouldn’t show.

New York law gives patients in nursing homes the right to be fully informed of their proposed treatment, including the right to refuse treatment and be free from chemical restraint unless consistent with certain requirements. However, psychotropic drugs are being used not just to treat illness but as a form of behavioral control. The Assembly Health Committee held a hearing in February in which patients’ families, advocates, and adult care experts testified to the frequency of overuse. A.7351 (Gottfried) requires that before psychotropic drugs are ordered in a nursing home or adult care facility, the patient or their surrogate must be informed of the potential benefits and side effects; dosage and duration of the prescription; reasonable alternatives (such as therapeutic activities); and their right to refuse consent. The bill also requires written consent by the patient or surrogate.

For more information on a particular bill, please contact the sponsor listed after the description. For the text of a bill, supporting memorandum, and information on its status, go to: http://public.leginfo.state.ny.us/menuf.cgi .

Credentialing for Group Practices – Requires insurers to expedite review of applications of health care professionals who are joining a group practice and grant provisional credentials to these professionals (A501, Cusick)

WELCOME!

I represent Chelsea, Hell’s Kitchen, Midtown, and parts of Murray Hill and the Lincoln Center area in the State Assembly. I have been chair of the Assembly Health Committee since 1987. During off hours, I like to write Chinese calligraphy.